Per imdb:After the crew of the Enterprise find an unstoppable force of terror from within their own organization, Captain Kirk leads a manhunt to a war-zone world to capture a one man weapon of mass destruction.

* This marks the first time a Star Trek film has shot outside the United States, with shooting in Iceland for special effects sequences.

* When calling down to the shuttle bay, Sulu commands the crew to prepare the transport captured during the "Mudd incident last month", a reference to the comic prequel "Star Trek: Countdown to Darkness".

PeekInside:

My two-bits:
Totally fun summer must-see, especially if you enjoyed the first movie from this Star Trek series directed by J.J. Abrams.

The countdown to the motion picture event of 2013 begins here, in this blockbuster 4-issue prequel mini-series that sets the stage for the upcoming Star Trek film! Like the best-selling Star Trek: Countdown in 2009, this all-new series leads directly into the next movie, with a story by Star Trek writer/producer Roberto Orci and Mike Johnson (Star Trek) ongoing series), and drawn by the original Star Trek: Countdown artist, David Messina! Star Trek: Countdown To Darkness is the can't-miss lead-in to the new adventures of the Enterprise crew!

Ensign Andrew Dahl has just been assigned to the Universal Union Capital Ship Intrepid, flagship of the Universal Union since the year 2456. It’s a prestige posting, and Andrew is even more thrilled to be assigned to the ship’s xenobiology laboratory, with the chance to serve on “Away Missions” alongside the starship’s famous senior officers.

Life couldn’t be better . . . until Andrew begins to realize that

(1) every Away Mission involves some kind of lethal confrontation with alien forces,

(2) the ship’s captain, its chief science officer, and the handsome Lieutenant Kerensky always survive these confrontations, and

(3) sadly, at least one low-ranked crew member is invariably killed.

Unsurprisingly, the savvier members belowdecks avoid Away Missions at all costs. Then Andrew stumbles on information that completely transforms his and his colleagues’ understanding of what the starship Intrepid really is . . . and offers them a crazy, high-risk chance to save their own lives.

Apron Bramhall has come unmoored. Fortunately, she’s about to be saved by Jesus. Not that Jesus—the actor who plays him in Jesus Christ Superstar. Apron is desperate to avoid the look-alike Mike, who’s suddenly everywhere, until she’s stuck in church with him one day. Then something happens—Apron’s broken teenage heart blinks on for the first time since she’s been adrift.

Mike and his boyfriend, Chad, offer her a summer job in their flower store, and Apron’s world seems to calm. But when she uncovers Chad’s secret, stormy seas return. Apron starts to see things the adults around her fail to—like what love really means, and who is paying too much for it.

Apron has come unmoored, but now she’ll need to take the helm if she’s to get herself and those she loves to safe harbor.

This is where it all started! The first classic Phryne Fisher mystery, featuring our delectable heroine, cocaine, communism and adventure. Phryne leaves the tedium of English high society for Melbourne, Australia, and never looks back.

The London season is in full fling at the end of the 1920s, but the Honorable Phryne Fisher--she of the green-grey eyes, diamant garters and outfits that should not be sprung suddenly on those of nervous dispositions--is rapidly tiring of the tedium of arranging flowers, making polite conversations with retired colonels, and dancing with weak-chinned men. Instead, Phryne decides it might be rather amusing to try her hand at being a lady detective in Melbourne, Australia.

Almost immediately from the time she books into the Windsor Hotel, Phryne is embroiled in mystery: poisoned wives, cocaine smuggling rings, corrupt cops and communism--not to mention erotic encounters with the beautiful Russian dancer, Sasha de Lisse--until her adventure reaches its steamy end in the Turkish baths of Little Lonsdale Street.

My two-bits:
In-a-word(s): determined sheila
Slight difference with the portrayal of this Phryne character versus the tv version. The book version is still very likable but a touch more serious.

I like that Phyrne is a single older female detective who is sexy, smart and sassy (for the 1920s time period). Other strong female characters are introduced that make this an appealing mystery series who gravitate towards women's fiction.

Sunday, June 23, 2013

fyi: Among 10 winners of the Seduction Tour, the author will pick 1 winner who will receive a Fantine necklace - Seduction themed (as seen on book cover).

~*~

* to see the original giveaway offer, click on the prize title links

* I will email winners for mailing addresses within two weeks.
Winners, feel free to contact me with your info if you don't get my email
or if you are just too darn excited and want to let me know -- like NOW ;-D

Saturday, June 22, 2013

Stacking The Shelves is all about sharing the books you are adding to your shelves, may it be physical or virtual. This means you can include books you buy in physical store or online, books you borrow from friends or the library, review books, gifts and of course ebooks!

From Powell's Indiespensable club package (details):Powell's subscription club delivers the best new books, with special attention to independent publishers. Signed first editions. Inventive, original sets. Exclusive printings.... Every six weeks, another installment to read and admire.

Per imdb:A modern retelling of Shakespeare's classic comedy about two pairs of lovers with different takes on romance and a way with words.

Neat-o trivia bits from imdb:

* In a May 2013 interview, Joss Whedon noted that aside from abridging the text, he stayed completely true to Shakespeare's original dialogue - except for the Act 2, Scene 3 line in which Benedick says "if I do not / love her, I am a Jew." It was changed to "if I do not love her, I am a fool."

* Many of the actors/actresses have worked previously with Joss Whedon on one or more of his works: Nathan Fillion (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Firefly, Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog), Amy Acker (Angel, Dollhouse, The Cabin in the Woods), Ashley Johnson (Dollhouse, The Avengers), Alexis Denisof (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, Dollhouse, The Avengers), Clark Gregg (The Avengers), Sean Maher (Firefly), Riki Lindhome (Buffy the Vampire Slayer), Fran Kranz (Dollhouse, The Cabin in the Woods), Tom Lenk (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, The Cabin in the Woods).

* This movie was filmed at Joss Whedon's Santa Monica home, which was designed and decorated by Whedon's wife Kai Cole. Cole suggested Whedon make it in lieu of going on vacation for their 20th anniversary because it had long been his passion project.

PeekInside: i love the music used for the trailer (Rose Rouge by St. Germain)

My two-bits:
Thoroughly good Shakespearean fun in a modern day black and white setting with witty wordplay.

~*~

GET familiar with the original...

Much Ado About Nothing
by William ShakespeareREAD it online.HEAR it online.

CHECK out this version...

Much Ado About Nothing
-Manga Shakespeare
by William Shakespeare
adapted by Richard Appignanesi
illustrated by Emma Vieceli

Pride & Prejudice meets Veronica Mars in this slick romantic spy-thriller where nothing’s as it seems.

Berry Fields is not looking for a boyfriend. She's busy trailing cheaters and liars in her job as a private investigator, collecting evidence of the affairs she's sure all men commit. And thanks to a pepper spray incident during an eighth grade game of spin the bottle, the guys at her school are not exactly lining up to date her, either.

So when arrogant—and gorgeous—Tanner Halston rolls into town and calls her "nothing amazing," it's no loss for Berry. She'll forget him in no time. She's more concerned with the questions surfacing about her mother's death.

But why does Tanner seem to pop up everywhere in her investigation, always getting in her way? Is he trying to stop her from discovering the truth, or protecting her from an unknown threat? And why can't Berry remember to hate him when he looks into her eyes?

With a playful nod to Jane Austen, Spies and Prejudice will captivate readers as love and espionage collide.

My two-bits:
In-a-word(s): amazing
Very fun read! This story had a great balance of Jane Austen elements and present day YA mystery.

Read about the magical world of cowboys, rabbits, and Ukrainian goddesses that unfolds when Zo's gruff baba from Ukraine arrives with her savage Caucasian Ovchorka dog. The ensuing chaos of clashing cultures catapults the characters into the extreme sport of rodeo at the Calgary Stampede. There, Vince Lapin, bull-rider extraordinaire, meets up with Susie Lago, protégé of Zo, and the outcome for the other rodeo contestants as well as the animal athletes changes stampede history. Good thing Zo has a best friend with an attractive older brother to soften the trauma. SOLSTICE MAGIC is magical realism for everybody who ever wished to be more than they are.

Listen to the musicians from Atom+Eve Studios perform "Safe at Home Again":

My two-bits:
In-a-word(s): indomitable spirit
Loved how this story magically mixes fairy tale and reality, old world and new world, young and old, humans and non... Also includes a sprinkling of love in the air.

* I will email winners for mailing addresses within two weeks.
Winners, feel free to contact me with your info if you don't get my email
or if you are just too darn excited and want to let me know -- like NOW ;-D

Monday, June 17, 2013

Instead of the traditional Q&A interview with MJ, I wanted to share a bit of her backstory on her latest novel...

~-~-~-~-~ guest ~-~-~-~-~
by M.J. Rose
~-~-~-~-~ guest ~-~-~-~-~

When Seduction comes out on Tuesday, May 7, 2013, readers who buy the hardcover and open it will find, what I hope, will be a surprise.

The endpapers (see above) show my hand written manuscript of the book along with the pen and the ink I wrote it with.

Why did I write 122,833 words in ink?

I love challenges, but to tell the story of Victor Hugo’s experiments with séances in his own voice? What kind of crazy idea had I come up with? Surely it was lunacy to even attempt it.

I don’t have literary illusions. I had just fallen in love with Hugo’s story and wanted to tell it. What fascinated me was how much had been written about his life as a statesman, poet and author of The Hunchback of Notre Dame and Les Misérables, but how little had been written about a certain part of his personal life: his dabbling with hashish, his preoccupation with reincarnation and the more than100 séances he’d conducted during a two year period while he lived on the Isle of Jersey.

During my research, I hadn’t once stopped to think that in order to tell the story of Hugo’s seduction by the spirit world, I would have to find his voice.

But there I was. Finally ready to write, sitting at a computer in a very 21st century world trying to conjure a mid 19th genius. For weeks I was stumped.

Then I had a revelation. I didn’t need to invoke the genius, just the man. I had read Hugo’s letters. I knew that the eloquence and brilliance of his poetry and prose didn’t always exhibit itself when he was writing to people close to him. Sometimes he was an extraordinary man saying ordinary things to his family.

That was the Hugo I needed to find try to find. The one who was relating a tale to an intimate. Not writing for the ages. Not trying to be brilliant – just attempting to reason out an unreasonable time in his life that had disturbed him.

But I still couldn’t do it. The cold keyboard, the sound of the mechanical clicking, the icons at the top of the page, the spell check. All of it was a gulf between me and the man I needed to channel. I decided it was hubris to even attempt to write this novel. Absurd to try. And yet, I couldn’t give up.

Carl Jung said that often coincidences aren’t coincidences at all.

One day in fit of frustration I got up from my desk in a huff and managed to tip over a jar of pens. One was an old fountain pen. It rolled and fell on the computer. I stared at it for a moment.

What if…

I found a bottle of ink. Filled the pen. Then pulled out a simple notebook and started to write. Not the way I write, on a computer, but the way Victor Hugo would have written over one hundred and fifty years ago. Pen on paper. I began. And as the ink flowed… the words flowed.

I don’t remember writing this book. Each day when I sat down and uncapped my pen I disappeared into the world of the novel. Three notebooks and 122,833 words later, I finished Seduction.

Seduction is the first novel I’ve written by hand. Perhaps the last. Definitely one of the most fascinating journeys I’ve ever taken.

She is a founding member and board member of International Thriller Writers and the founder of the first marketing company for authors: AuthorBuzz.com. She runs the popular blog; Buzz, Balls & Hype.

Getting published has been an adventure for Rose who self-published Lip Service late in 1998 after several traditional publishers turned it down. Editors had loved it, but didn't know how to position it or market it since it didn't fit into any one genre.

Frustrated, but curious and convinced that there was a readership for her work, she set up a web site where readers could download her book for $9.95 and began to seriously market the novel on the Internet.

After selling over 2500 copies (in both electronic and trade paper format) Lip Service became the first e-book and the first self-published novel chosen by the LiteraryGuild/Doubleday Book Club as well as being the first e-book to go on to be published by a mainstream New York publishing house.

Rose has been profiled in Time magazine, Forbes, The New York Times, Business 2.0, Working Woman, Newsweek and New York Magazine.

Rose has appeared on The Today Show, Fox News, The Jim Lehrer NewsHour, and features on her have appeared in dozens of magazines and newspapers in the U.S. and abroad, including USAToday, Stern, L'Official, Poets and Writers and Publishers Weekly.

Rose graduated from Syracuse University and spent the '80s in advertising. She was the Creative Director of Rosenfeld Sirowitz and Lawson and she has a commercial in the Museum of Modern Art in NYC.

She lives in Connecticut with Doug Scofield, a composer, and their very spoiled dog, Winka.

From the author of The Book of Lost Fragrances comes a haunting novel about a grieving woman who discovers the lost journal of novelist Victor Hugo, awakening a mystery that spans centuries.

In 1843, novelist Victor Hugo’s beloved nineteen-year-old daughter drowned. Ten years later, Hugo began participating in hundreds of séances to reestablish contact with her. In the process, he claimed to have communed with the likes of Plato, Galileo, Shakespeare, Dante, Jesus—and even the Devil himself. Hugo’s transcriptions of these conversations have all been published. Or so it was believed.

Recovering from her own losses, mythologist Jac L’Etoile arrives on the Isle of Jersey—where Hugo conducted the séances—hoping to uncover a secret about the island’s Celtic roots. But the man who’s invited her there, a troubled soul named Theo Gaspard, has hopes she’ll help him discover something quite different—Hugo’s lost conversations with someone called the Shadow of the Sepulcher.

What follows is an intricately plotted and atmospheric tale of suspense with a spellbinding ghost story at its heart, by one of America’s most gifted and imaginative novelists.

Saturday, June 15, 2013

Stacking The Shelves is all about sharing the books you are adding to your shelves, may it be physical or virtual. This means you can include books you buy in physical store or online, books you borrow from friends or the library, review books, gifts and of course ebooks!

~*~

For Review:

The Silent Deal:
The Card Game, Book 1
by Levi Stack
courtesy of author
Thanks Levi!

From Powell's Indiespensable club package (details):Powell's subscription club delivers the best new books, with special attention to independent publishers. Signed first editions. Inventive, original sets. Exclusive printings.... Every six weeks, another installment to read and admire.

Oct. 11th, 1943 - A British spy plane crashes in Nazi-occupied France. Its pilot and passenger are best friends. One of the girls has a chance at survival. The other has lost the game before it's barely begun.

When "Verity" is arrested by the Gestapo, she's sure she doesn't stand a chance. As a secret agent captured in enemy territory, she's living a spy's worst nightmare. Her Nazi interrogators give her a simple choice: reveal her mission or face a grisly execution.

As she intricately weaves her confession, Verity uncovers her past, how she became friends with the pilot Maddie, and why she left Maddie in the wrecked fuselage of their plane. On each new scrap of paper, Verity battles for her life, confronting her views on courage, failure and her desperate hope to make it home. But will trading her secrets be enough to save her from the enemy?

A Michael L. Printz Award Honor book that was called "a fiendishly-plotted mind game of a novel" in The New York Times, Code Name Verity is a visceral read of danger, resolve, and survival that shows just how far true friends will go to save each other.

Series:
Code Name Verity
Rose Under Fire - just released: June 3, 2013

A challenging and exceptional read, indeed. It is one of those books that stumps you in the end and then makes you want to re-read it to catch things missed. I read this book earlier in the year and it is only now that I can fully appreciate how good it is.

Working Tokyo nightclubs is easy money for beautiful and troubled American Val Benson - until a wealthy client with a dark past and sinister hobbies reluctantly gives up a map to one of the greatest treasures lost in World War II. With yakuza, motorcycle gangs, rogue CIA, treasure hunters, pimps, Thai boxers and her Congressman father snapping at her high heels, Val burns a trail of destruction across Japan, Hong Kong, Thailand and the Burmese borderlands to get the loot before someone less deserving does.

From comfort women and tomb-raiding in Japanese-occupied Burma to the murderous echoes of the Vietnam War, long forgotten crimes come roaring back to life. Val, a new anti-hero of Asian Noir, ambiguous and unreliable, takes her dark, epic journey with her friends: a Japanese nightclub hostess with broken dreams, a British kickboxer, and a washed up Australian treasure hunter. The superficial party girl, confronted by mounting horrors, must dig deep to discover an inner courage to survive and win the prize - and maybe redemption. Gaijin Cowgirl by American writer Jame DiBiasio is a breathless, violent page-turner with a surprising, dangerous heroine to match.

Zombie sighting:It was all shit but I was alive, and in Honkers, with that bullshit job and everything, that was when I really was a zombie.
- page 215, chapter 16

My two-bits:
In-a-word(s): treasure

I found this to be an engrossing thriller that goes into some historical events - one being, the comfort women of WWII.

The main character experiences a kind of coming-of-age and sense of worth throughout the story which kept my attention.

--~ Book Giveaway courtesy of book tour ~--

WIN a copy of this book!

Open to all.

Winner's choice of print (for US only) OR mobi, or pdf (for international).

* I will email winners for mailing addresses within two weeks.
Winners, feel free to contact me with your info if you don't get my email
or if you are just too darn excited and want to let me know -- like NOW ;-D

Sunday, June 9, 2013

Stacking The Shelves is all about sharing the books you are adding to your shelves, may it be physical or virtual. This means you can include books you buy in physical store or online, books you borrow from friends or the library, review books, gifts and of course ebooks!

From Powell's Indiespensable club package (details):Powell's subscription club delivers the best new books, with special attention to independent publishers. Signed first editions. Inventive, original sets. Exclusive printings.... Every six weeks, another installment to read and admire.